Immortality and Joy

Author(s): Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: Champat Rai Jain
Catalog link: https://jainqq.org/explore/006705/1

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Immortality and Joy - C. R. Jalna.

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PREFACE. No preface is nooded for a short article like the one now being placed in the reader's hands, but it is necessary to say that its title refers back to a small pamphlet, publishod a fow years ago under the title of the Gospel of Immortality, the main topics of which have since been thoroughly reconsidered and incorporated in my work on comparative Religion, entitled the Key of Knowledge. As the prosent articla conveys the message of the Creed of Tirthamkaras, that 'is, Jainism, which enables the soul to acquire everlasting happiness and dominion over death, it is the rightful successor to the work alluded to. Hence its nama--the Gospel of Immortality and Joy. It will also not be out of place here to state that a portion of the article has already appeared in the Special Number of the Digambar Jain for 1918-19, for which it, was oririnally written. It has now been revised and enlarged is the request of the Jain Sabha, Simli, to be distributed a:nyuz the visitors on the occasion of the Consecration of their new Temple at the summer capital of India. HARIO!: Yth V., 379. C.R. JAIN

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* 3 * zrI vItarAgAya nmH| THE GOSPEL OF IMMORTALITY AND JOY. It will undoubtedly be a geat surprise to many of our non-Jaina friends to be told that sainism is not an idolatrous creed and is as bitterly opposed to idol worship as the most iconoclastic religion in the world, yet the fact is as stated. The attitude of Jainism towards idolatry is evident from the following from the Ratna Karanda Sravakachara, a work of paramount authority, composed by Sri Samantabhadracharya, who flourished about the commencement of the second century A. D: "Bathing in the so-called sacred] rivors and oceans, setting ap heaps of sand and stones (as objects of worship), immolating one-self by falling from a precipice or by being burnt up in fire (as in Sati) are some of the common murhatas (follies). The worshipping, with desire, to obtain favour of deities whose minds are full of personal likes and dislikes is called the folly of devotion to false divinity. Know that to be guru murhata which consists in the worshipping of false ascetics revolving in the wheel of samsara (births and deaths, i. e. transmigration), who have neither ronounced worldly goods, nor occupations nor, himsa (causing injury to others)."

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( 2 ) This is suffcient authority for the view that Jainism strongly condemns fetish worship-the cult of rivers, stones and the like-as well as devotion to human and super-human beings who have not eradicated their lower nature, that is to say who are liable to be swayed by passion and by personal likes a id dislikes. What, then, is the significance of the image-worship which takes place daily in our temples, and which is, undoubtedly, the cause of the false impression that has been formed by the non- -Jainas concerning our faith? To explain the nature of the worship that is performed in our temples, it is necessary first of all to summarise the Jaina creed, which fully accounts for it. The Jainas believe that every soul is godly by nature and endowed with all those attributes of perfection which are associated with our truest and best conceptions of divinity. These divine attributes-omniscience, bliss and the like-are, however, not actully manifest in the case of the soul that is involved in transmigration, but will become so when it attains to nirvana. Nirvana implies complete freedom from all those impurities of sin which limit and curtail the natural attributes and properties of the soul. Accordingly, the Jainas aspire to become Gods by crossing the sea of samsara (births and deaths), and the creed they follow to obtain that devoutly-wished-for consummation is the method which was followed by those who have already reached the goal in view

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mirvana. It is this method which is known as Jainism, and the images that are installed in our temples are the statues of 'photos' of the greatest amongst those who have already reached nirvana and taught others the way to get there. They are called Tirthamkaras, Literally, the makers or founders of a tirtha, a fordable channel or passage (across the ocean of births and deaths. ) How did they cross the sea of samsara themselves ? By curbing their fieshly lusts and by purifying and perfecting their souls. We too, have got to tread the path they trod, if we would attain to the heights they have attained. In a word, the Tirihamkaras are models of perfection for our souls to copy and to walk in the footsteps of. Their images are kept in the temples to constantly remind us of our high ideal, and to inspire us with faith and confidence in our own souls. As for Their worship, They have no desire to be worshipped by us; Their perfection is immeasurably greaten than we can praise; They are full and perfect in Their woleness. We offer Them the devotion of our hearts, because in the initial stages of the journey'it is the most potent, if not the only means of making steady progress. Itis not mere hero-worship, though worship of a hero is transcendent admiration. As Carlyle put it, it is something more; we admire what we ourselves aspire to attain to.

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The great English thinker, Thomas Carlyle, tells us: "I say great mon are still admirable. I say there is at bottom, nothing else admirable! No nobler feeling than this of admiration for one higher than himself dwells in the breast of man. It is to this hour, and at all hours, the vivifying influence in man's life............ Hero-worship endures for ever while man enduros. Boswell venerates his Johnson, right truly even in the Eighteenth century. The uubelieving French believe in their Voltire; and burst out round him into very curious Hero-worship in that last act of his life when they stille him under rosos... ............ At Paris his carriage is the nucleus of a connet, wbose train fills whole streets. The ladies pluck a hair or two from his fur, to keep it its a sacred relic. There was nothing highest, beautifullost, noblest in all trauce, that did not feel this man to be higher, beautifuller, nobler ............It will ever be so. We all love great men; love, venerate and bow down submissive before great men: nay can we honestly bow down to any thing else! Ah, does not every true men feel that he is himself made higher by doing reverence to what is really above him? No nobler or more blessed feeling dwells in man's heart. And to me it is very cheering to consider that no sceptical logic, or general triviality, insincerity and aridity of any time and its influences can destroy this noble in-born loyalty and worsbip that is in man....... It is an eternal cornerstone, from which they can begin to build themselves up...... That man in some sense or other, worships; heroes that we all of us reverence and must over roverence Great Men this is, to me, the living rock amid all rushings-down whatsoever."

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( 5 ) The italics are ours, and they speak for themselves. Even to-day men and women assemble, in thousands, in Trafalgar Square in London to do honour to a statue of stone that stands there; they illuminate the whole neighbourhood; they place garlands of flowers on the object of their adoration. Is it idolatry they practise? Are they idolators? No, no, such a thing is simply impossible; no one can accuse the English of idolatry ! It is not worshipping the block of stone; they ask rothing from it; they offer it no food, nor do they pray to it. If you look more closely into their 'statue-worship you will find it to be the adoration of a something of which the figure is a symbol. It is not the statue of Nelson they assemble to worship, but the spirit of the brave man, the fearless sailor, who made England what she is to-day--the acknowledged Queen of the Seas The English are a nation of sailors; take away their sea-power, and they are gone. But for the glorious achievements of the British Navy, England would have been overrun by Germany to-day. The English know it, and pour forth, spontaneously, almost unconsciously, the warmest devotion of their free hearts on the one being who saved them from utter ruin in the past. But if Nelson himself was able to save England from destruction once, his inspiration has been her salvation not once, not twice, but repeatedly. The great sailor is now dead; he may no longer command the fleet of England in the hour of danger; he may win no more laurels for himself of victories

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(6 ) for his country; but his spirit and influence survive. For there is not a sailor lad in the whole of the United Kingdom who does not brighten up at the meution of Nelson's name,who does not reverently recognise him as a model of greatness for himself, who does not draw powerful nspiration from his life. The nation that placed the statue of this great man in a conspicuous part of the capital of their country knew they were not inerely erecting a statue to the memory of a dead man, but lurying the foundation stone of their own greatness for generations to come. Such is the true significance of Nelson-worship' which takes place on the Trafalgar Day annually. It is not idolatry that we can charge against the English, but idealatry, wbich, if a fault, is one that has been the source of unparalleled greatness the culprit! The Jaina form of worship is, similarly, an instance of idealatry, for devotion to God in Jainism only means levotion to the attributes of divinity which the devotee wishes to develope in his soul, and consists in the blending of the fullest measure of love and respect for those Great Ones who have envolved out those very attributes to perfection in their own case. They ainas ask, for nothing from their Tirthamkaras, no payers are ever offered to Them, nor are they supposed to be granting boons to Their devotees. They are not worshipped because worship is pleasing to Them, but because it the source of the greatest good- the attainment of godly

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(7) perfection-to our own souls. As said in the Key of Knowledge, the causal connection between the ideal of the soul and the worshipping of Those who have already realized it is to be found in the fact that the realization of an ideal demands one's wholehearted attention, and is only possible by following in the footsteps of those who have actually reached the same goal. It is this idea which a great English poet has immortalized in the following words: Lives of great men all remind us We can make our lives sublime, And, departing, leave behind as Footprints ou the sands of time: Footprints that perhaps another, Sailing o'er life's solemn mainA forlorn and ship-wrecked brother, Seeing, shall take heart again." C The daily puja and prakshala of the pratibimbas of the Holy Tirthamkaras are the source of much good; they tend to strengthen one's faith at the same time as they enable merit to be acquired by the withdrawal of the mind from the attachments and concerns of the world and by its being directed to the true side of Life. The whole scheme of worship in Jainism is that from the moment one sets one's foot in the temple till the time of one's departure from it, one should be constantly accu

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(8 ) mulating merit and the increase of piety and dharma. The objection : how can an inanimate object, like an image of metal or stone, be the cause of so much good ?- is met by the parable of the dead harlot propounded in the Parast'a Purana, The deceasee courtesan, in the porable, was a woman of remarkable beauty and of great personal charms, and as her body lay on the ground three living beings-a sadhu, a licentious libertine and a jachal- ga: hercd round it. Of these, thit: sudhu was filled wiih the spirit of vairagya at the sight of her matchless beauty, and with pity for lier departed spirit, thinking that if her life had been as virtuous and good as her beauty was faultless she was certain to obtain heaven and nirvana. The libertine, on the other hand, feasted his tres ci: the volup. tuous contour of the prestrate figure before him, and abandoned himself to the agrecable hallucinations of pleasure it was calculated to afford in life. As for the jackal, he only prowled about, waiting for the departure of the other two to devour the corpse. The effect of their diverse nicial states on the three individuals was that the sadliu went to heaven after death, the libertine descended into hell, but the jackal remained where he was before, that is to say he was reborn among the beasts of prey in his next incarnation. The principle to be deduced from the parable is that internal mental states are occasioned by external cbjects and things, and become the determining factors of the conditions of future life.

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( 9 ) The pratibimbas of the Holy Tirthamkas.de-: picting Them in the serene dispassionate attitude of pure equanimity, inspire us with the holiest of thoughts and engender the true spirit of vairagya in our hearts; they also teach us the correct posture foi meditation and dhyana, Consecrated photos of Living Divinity, they are well calculated to awaken the divine in ourselves, inspiring us with confidence in our own souls by the example of the Great Ones whom they represent. For all the Tirtha!nkaras were, at one time, men of flesh and blood like ourselves, aye, and sinful souls too ; but They have destroyed the bondage of Their karmas while we are still involved in it. Jainism is the scientific Path of Perfection, and its first principle is that no results are ever achieved except by one's own exertion The Holy Ones put this great principle into practice and perfected Themselves, attaining to heights of glory beyond the imagination of ordinary men. Pure perfect Knowledge, embracing all the facts of the three worlds-Celestial Realins, our Own World and the Lower Regions (Patulu, hells and the like.com and of the three times,past present and future, infinite perception, undying, unending, unabating bliss and innumerable other divine qualities find an abode in Their pure soure souls. Death, disease, sorrow and sickness cannot affect Them; They are beyond the reach of ill luck and pain. Those who follow Them attain to Their Greatness and Perfection, and becoming like Them in all respects reacbo

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( 10 ) nirvana at the top of the universe, to reside there, for ever, in the undisturbed enjoyment of infinite peace, tranquillity and joy, together with all those other attributes--omniscience, immortality and the like-which people associate with their Gods. For divinity is verily the real nature of the soul, though it is defiled and vitiated by the forces engendered by individual karmas in the case of unredeemed beings. Jainism is the creed which enables the soul to destroy the bondage of karma, and the Tirthamkaras are the greatest friends and well-wishers of jivas souls) whom They take by the hand, as it were, and carry across the turbulent sea of samsara, proviced They are allowed to do so. Who, then can describe the glory of the system, what language is competent to paint the Greatness of the Masters that enable the soul to free itself from its inauspicious bondage of karmas, that im part it strength and courage to defy such powerful foes as sickness and ceath,that enable it to attain to unsurpassed splendour-in short, that turn puny, miserable mortals into omniscient blissful Gods, the object of worship and adoration for all times to come? As said in the Ratna Karanda Sravaracharu: .."Those wlose hearts have been purified by Right Faith become the Lords of Splendour, Energy, Wisdom, Prowess, Fame, Wealth, Victory and Greatness; they are born in high

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( 1 ) families, and possess the ability to realise the highest ideals of Life; they are the best of men. "Those who are endowed with Right Faith are born in the Heaven-world where they become the devotees of Lord Jinendra, and endowed with eight kinds of miraculous powers and splendour, enjoy themselves for long milleniums in the company of devus and devangnas. " By virtue of Right Faith men acquire the supreme Status of a Tirthamkara, the Master who knows all things well, whose feet are worshipped by the Ruler of devas, Lords of asuras and kings of men, as well as by holy saints, who is the Support of Dharma, and the protector of all living beings in the three worlds. "They who take refuge in Right Faith finally attain to the Supreme Seat, i.e., moksha, which is free from old age, disease, destruction, decrease, grief, fear and doubt, and implies unqualified perfection in respect of wisdom and Bliss, and freedom from all kinds of impurities of karma...

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( 12 ) " The bhavya who follows the creed of the Holy Tirthamkaras acquires the immeasurable glory of deva life and the discus of a chakravarti before whom kings and rulers of men prostrate themselves, and attaining to supremely worshipful status of Goodhood finally also reaches nirvana." Sri Jaina Dharma Ki Jai. Printed by Kapur Chand Jain, at the Kabavit Prou, Agra